—Tanzania
The amount of time it takes
is unclear, and yet,
it happens—
the swan’s wings
carve down, down until the body
is meeting the water
and friction takes over.
Then—the hopelessness,
the petrification,
that suddenly-graceless body
is gripped and remolded
into ash, sulfur, stone.
I imagine how the feathers,
at the ends of the tail and wings, quiver
until the last moment. The tongue
and eyes, too, the yellow
glimpse, the black tongue,
before being neutrally pardoned
on a dull-gray lake.
*
Title taken from Nick Brandt’s Across the Ravaged Lake